The Wind Will Take Us
by aequuitas
Summary: In a post-apocalyptic world where poisonous storms try to tear the world apart, a handful of survivors drift across open terrain, desperately trying to survive. This is that story. Beta'd by the lovely bound-in-wolfsbane (as can be found on Tumblr)
1. Chapter 1

It moves in a glorified slow motion, more for effect than out of necessity. Speed won't mean anything for its trajectory or effectiveness. No matter what happens, it's on a straight and narrow path, moving directly towards them and they both know there's nothing they can do about it. Two men, one tall and one taller, stand side by side, watching its advancement with a kind of detached interest. The tall one readjusts his grip on the sword in his hand, glances at the taller.  
"You ready Sammy?" His voice is rough with disuse, or very frequent use as it may be. The dust picks up the edge of his tattered shirt, brushes it against his skin.  
"You know it's gonna call it's friends, right? Plan a little feast, maybe stop for a quick siesta before moving on?"

The taller, Sammy, quirks a smile, nods, "Sons of bitches take naps now?" He has his own sword in his hand, long coat swirling around his ankles, and it's a wonder they could even get one long enough for him, especially these days. It's a nice one too, tanned leather, long enough in the arms and wide enough in the shoulders to give him space for movement. "If we were any kind of smart we'd be out of here by now."

"Good thing we're not that kind of smart," Dean widens his stance, brings his free hand to grip around the end of the sword, fighting stance ready to face the beast and then he glances to the dark sky. Sky's always dark now, ever since the storms. Returning his gaze to the beast Dean watches as it lumbers towards them with the same purposeful slowness that means it intends to kill. With an exaggerated slowness that makes Dean grin wider, Sam moves to match Dean's stance, perfect mirrors of each other.

Just before it reaches them the beast throws its head back and howls, long and loud, calling in for backup. Then it starts up, running faster, a loping gait that makes it seem like it's wounded. Sam and Dean both know it's not.

When it reaches them, all hell breaks loose. Dean lunges for the side, drawing his sword across the underbelly of the beast while Sam rolls the opposite direction, not even trying to hit it. Instead he stands his ground as five more come rolling towards them. He's prepared, knows the moves, knows how to keep them at bay, and knows he can't spare a look for Dean, not now. There's grunts of exertion mixed in with the snarls of the beast, but still Sam doesn't look. Instead, he feints right as the first comes, then throws himself to the left, hitting the ground and rolling, rising to his fight and thrusting his sword forward in one perfect motion as the first beast sprawls across him. His strike hits home but he knows he's misjudged the distances as the falls backwards, the beast's dead weight on top of him. He cries out as his left arm bends the wrong way and the butt of the sword currently buried in the beast's chest rams into his ribs. Dean yells his name but Sam is already rolling, shoving the beast sideways, pulling his sword out of its flesh and standing up again. This time, he throws a glance at Dean, who has finished with his own beast and is moving in towards the other four. Shaking himself off Sam strides towards his brother until they're walking in perfect time, side by side.

"You good?" Dean doesn't look at him, knows it's suicide to take his eyes off the beasts, but his voice is filled with a concern that, while appreciated, Sam hates to hear.

"Fucked up my wrist," Sam replies truthfully, because they learned a long time ago that lying never got them anywhere, "Ribs are gonna be bruised good tomorrow. I've had worse. Let's send this bitches back to wherever they came from and then you can worry about me."

Dean huffs a laugh, makes a noise of agreement, and then they're attacking again. They've warmed up now, killed one each already today and they each take another two with quick, practiced precision. The world ended six years ago, but Sam and Dean have been hunting monsters long before that.

-

"Fucking idiot, you know that?"

"Yes, Dean."

"Beast comes at you and you wanna stab it in the chest, fine, but don't fucking leave yourself as a pillow for it to land on."

"Yes, Dean."

"I'm serious Sam! How fucking embarrassed would you be if you got crushed to death?"

"Yes, Dean."

Dean looks up from the task of wrapping Sam's injured hand _(sprained, the fucker)_ to smack his little brother across the head. Sam makes a pained sound but keeps his head ducked, grinning. "You better listen to me dumbass. I don't wanna be scraping your flattened, dead ass off the desert floor, got it?"

Sam smirks, pauses, and then answers. "Yes, Dean." And has to roll out of the way fast before Dean can hit him again. The movement makes his ribs twinge and he lets out a surprised huff of air. "Hey, I'm injured here!"

"And whose fault is that smartass?"

"You're contradicting yourself now big brother, cause I was a dumbass before,"

"I swear to god I'm going to kick your ass into the next county." Dean looks genuinely annoyed as he collects the bandages up and shoves them back into the improvised first-aid bag they have. Moving to put it into his backpack he glances over his shoulder at his stupid floppy haired little brother, "Where we stayin' for the night?" Can't stay out in the deserts unprotected at night. Not unless you want to die.

"Close to the Roadhouse, we can swing by there, see if they got any extra room." Sam knows the response before it even comes, but it disappoints him all the same.

"Ellen's overcrowded as it is. You know that Sammy," After the storms hit, the Roadhouse became an improvised refugee camp for hunters and their families. Then word of it spread and people started showing up out of nowhere, hundreds of them. Now it's a huge compound, surrounded by improvised walls and barbed wire, with what seems like miles of network tunnels running beneath it. Right at the center sits the Roadhouse, and in the middle of the Roadhouse sits Ellen, making sure everything runs smooth as it can. Course, a post-apocalyptic world isn't exactly a lucrative business. "Try somewhere closer."

"There's the southwest bunker few miles from here. Take us till nightfall to get there but it's better than stayin' out here and freezing to death." Or worse was implied at the end but neither of them said it. Enough troubles without putting them into a verbal stamp of definition.

"Yeah, alright." Standing Dean picks up Sam's backpack and tosses it to him, then picks up his own and slings it over his back. Pulling on the straps he rolls his shoulders and watches Sam flex his hand, testing for flexibility. Apparently he's satisfied because he picks up his sword belt and straps it back on, throwing Dean his own, which he also straps on. Damn but Dean misses his guns. With ammo all over the world getting low and the beasts getting stronger and stronger a gun just wasn't practical anymore. Still, it always seemed better than getting up close and personal to Dean. He hated being close enough to feel the beast's breath on his face. Damned wrong was what it was.

The brothers start walking together, in sync, in the same direction, no words of direction needed. They walk for less than five minutes before Dean says, "Aliens." He grins as Sam sighs, because Sam knows this game and he doesn't like this game, but they play it anyway.

_Guess Why The World Is Ending_ isn't exactly up to game show standards but it's born from too much whiskey and too little sleep, and they've been playing it for three years now so Dean figures why the hell not?

"What would aliens gain from sending in poisonous dust storms that kill all the animals and mutate all the monsters? C'mon, that was weak even for you," Sam pauses, thinking, then says, "God's righteous and holy anger." And there's a hint of cynicism in his voice because they both stopped believing in any type of God a long time ago.

Dean shakes his head, "Nah, if he wanted us wiped off the map he probably would'a sent some messiah or something to warn us first, convert all our unholy, little hearts to get us to heaven and then kill off the non-believers."

"Maybe he did send a messiah, just not to us."

"Well then he's an asshole. We saved like half the people on this planet, I'm pretty sure we deserved to be saved a little ourselves." Dean's exaggerating obviously, but it's clear he's serious about being saved. Serious about Sam being saved at least.

"Alright, alright, calm your virtuous little heart." A pause and then, "Besides, it's your turn to go."  
Dean grins.

The game carries them almost halfway there, but Sam draws the line at _'It's a government conspiracy to turn us all into lizard people Sammy!'_Eye-Spy carries them the rest of the way and for a little while Sam feels like a kid again, thrown into the car for fourteen hours at six-years-old and demanding that Dean play with him so they're not bored.

When they reach the bunker it's a weird kind of relief.

It takes Sam's cold numbed fingers several minutes to find the ring buried under the sand, and it takes his and Dean's combined strength to pull the door up.  
It's made of a heavy iron, the edges sealed in tight with an improvised insulin to keep out the toxic fumes. Sam goes down first, hands clinging tightly to the metal bars of the ladder as he descends. Once he's safely at the bottom Dean follows, making sure he's far enough down to be clear before he grabs the metal chain and pulls the door closed after him.

For a moment they're plunged into total darkness, and then Sam lights up one of the battery powered lanterns to illuminate the small space. Thank god for Ash, friggin' genius figured out how to make new batteries, easily charged and lasting for close to two years. Sam's still not sure how he did it, but he knows that he's happy as shit the mullet adorned kid found out how.

After he's hung the lantern on the hook in the middle of the ceiling, letting the light wash over the whole room, Sam sits down heavily on the bottom bunk of the old metal bunk bed that stands pushed into one corner. A second is pushed into the opposite corner, and there's additional bedrolls on the shelving units that line one of the walls. Sam loves being in these bunkers sometimes, because it's such a cool reminder of how humans rose to the challenge of the apocalypse. Nothing could've been done for the first wave of people taken out by the storms. They swept across most of the southern hemisphere first, and millions were dead before anyone knew what was happening. Word spread to America, and for once the government acted with intelligence. Hundreds of underground bunkers of various sizes were built throughout the country and filled with dehydrated foods, bedding supplies and water. It was nowhere near enough, but it was something. Sam always thought of it like the Titanic. America was the ship, taking precautions but still thinking it could rise above and be immune to the storms that were killing half of the planet. Didn't pack enough life boats.

Sam and Dean were in a bunker in Arizona when Texas was wiped off the map, huddled in with a family of six that had a seven-year-old son, twin daughters of five-years-old and one screaming six month old child. Sam ended up having the two girls clinging to either side of him, faces buried in his chest, while Dean ended up with baby. It was six hours of hell. Texas was taken out and the storm rolling over them with a roar that seemed to put everything into perspective. It was the exact moment where Sam realized that, in the grand scheme of things, they were specks, inconsequential. When the eight of them finally crawled from the bunker, stiff and sore and lungs aching for fresh air, the land was a desolation of dead and dying. Everything from plants to people were collapsed, and Sam had started hyperventilating when he'd caught sight of the kid clinging to the bunker door, wheezing and struggling to draw in air because no one had heard him to let him in. It had taken Dean more than half an hour to calm Sam down, and by then they'd been in desperate need of movement, had to get out of there as fast as possible.

That was the first storm the Winchester brothers experienced.

It was most certainly not the last.

But they adapted, because that's what Winchesters did. So, Sam kicks off his boots and twists until he's lying horizontal on the bunk breathing deep to test his ribs out. He can hear Dean bustling around the echo-y chamber but doesn't open his eyes. Dean was gonna do what he was gonna do, and Sam knows he's not gonna be able to slow him down either way. Finally the swishing of Dean's jeans stop near Sam's head, and a cool hand comes down to rest on his forehead.

"You feel a little warm." Which yeah, Sam got was abnormal in the cold space, but he pushes Dean's hand off anyway.

"I'm always warm dude, you know that." Course Dean knew that, how many times throughout their lives had he commented on Sam being a human furnace?

"Warmer than usual, bitch. I know what temperature you run at." Oh.

Sam sighs and rolls over, curling up. "Then let me sleep it off." His words come out muffled as his face was now pressed into the pillow, "M fuckin' tired as hell." A blanket lands on his back and Sam wants to rolls his eyes at Dean's mother-henning but he's already half asleep.

It's not three hours later and Dean's watching Sam sleep when the bunker door pounds above them. It makes Dean jump and, to Dean's annoyance, jolts Sam awake. The brothers stare at each other for a minute before Sam's practically leaping to open the door. Dean doesn't try and stop him because he was there when that kid died too, and he knows how hard it is to realize you could have saved someone. He watches Sam climb the ladder and push up on the trapdoor, giving it enough so that the person above can pull it all the way open. That's the thing about those doors, you can get 'em open when you have two reasonably strong people, but one person by themselves or one person with someone injured doesn't have any chance. Once it's wide enough open Sam moves back down the ladder to let the person through. He and Dean stand shoulder to shoulder, watching the newcomer's descent.

It's a man, that much is obvious from the figure and build, the shape of the brow. The rest of the dark face is covered with a scarf, leaving only the eyes up visible. It's not uncommon to see nowadays, people thinking that a layer of cloth will protect them from the storms. They're dead wrong but who's to take that hope away from them? Once the guy's all the way down Dean moves to grab the chain and pull the door closed before moving back to Sam, standing just a tiny bit in front of his little brother.

For a minute the two parties stare each other down, Sam and Dean on one side and the masked stranger on the other. Then the guy pulls down his scarf, revealing a dark face with worry lines and an unhappy looking mouth. Dean can't imagine the guy eve smiling.

A few more moments of silence and then, "I'm Gordon."


	2. Chapter 2

After names are exchanged, the three men retreat to opposite sides of the room, Sam and Dean sitting on the bottom bunk of the bed Sam had been sleeping in, Gordon practically collapsing onto the other. The Winchester boys push themselves back on the bed so their backs are against it, shoulders pressed tight against each other. Gordon is the opposite, perched practically on the edge of his own bed, eyes haunted and watchful.

There's about ten minutes of an awkward silence between them all in which Dean forces Sam's uncooperative hands into a pair of black fingerless gloves, if only to keep him from pulling off the gauze, before Dean feels Sam's head connect solidly with his shoulder, and Dean knows his little brother is asleep again. Moving gently he pulls the arm pinned between his and Sam's bodies free and wraps it around the younger man's shoulders and pulls him more snugly into Dean's body. Sam relaxes into the hold, years of muscle memory telling him that his big brother is there, and watching, and it's safe. He's got his long, shaggy hair pulled back now, tied with a piece of twine to keep it off his face, and somehow it makes him look younger, more vulnerable. The sight of it makes Dean's protective instincts flare, and he finds himself tightening his grip on Sam's shoulders.

When Dean looks up from watching Sam settle in, Gordon is watching them with a dark gaze. Dean quirks an eyebrow but other than cocking his head to the side, Gordon has no response.

It's not like Dean cares what other people think of him and Sam, they've been this way since they were kids, closer than normal, almost strangely codependent. They grew up practically sitting in each other's pockets; it's to be expected. Still, to people who don't know them it seems bizarre. Some people have called it sick in the past, used to comment to John that he should be more strict in keeping his boys apart before something unnaturally started happening. Of course John ignored them all, because he needed someone to raise Sam and Dean was it. By the time the first of the storms hit Sam and Dean were practically attached at the hip, the storms only serving to push them closer together. They've been watching each other's backs ever since, and a few weird looks from the rare times they run into someone isn't going to do anything in pushing the Winchesters apart.

"You boys headin' anywhere specific?" The voice in the otherwise unbroken silence is so unexpected that Dean actually jumps a little bit, making Sam snuffle against him before pressing his head into Dean's chest.

"Just travelling, y'know. Tryin' to find somewhere to settle down I suppose," It's not exactly a lie, Dean would love to be able to find a place safe enough to stay, even if only for a few months. He knows it's never going to happen though, both himself and Sam too stubborn to leave people at the mercy of the beasts. "You?"

"Headin' East. Heard there's still livable settlements over there, above ground, where the storms haven't killed it all off,"

Dean knows of those settlements, he'd heard of them months ago. Supposedly they were up around Virginia and the surrounding states; safe havens that managed to block out the storms. It was bullshit though. As soon as the Winchesters got wind of it they headed that way, hoping to find somewhere to send people who had nowhere else to go. By the time they got there, the settlements were all gone leaving bones of buildings and people as the only evidence they'd ever existed in the first place. Sam and Dean had almost died up there because there were so few underground bunkers to take refuge in. People had put so much faith in their steel reinforced buildings that they'd disregarded the idea of them failing. Dean gave an internal snort of bitter smugness. They should have known you couldn't outwit Mother Nature. "I'd give it up now. We've been up there, there's nothing left. No settlements, no people. All of it got wiped out in the big storm few years back, the one that had almost all of America covered at once," And from the look of despair on Gordon's face he knows exactly what Dean is talking about.

"Fuck's sake," Gordon says after a minute, "Is there anywhere left to go? Anywhere safe?"

_Roadhouse, _Dean thinks, but there's something about Gordon that seems so untrustworthy Dean doesn't even want to tell him about it. It's not his place to choose whether or not someone gets to live though, so he nods, "Place called the Roadhouse, not all that far from here. Maybe few days walk, but there's bunkers 'tween here and there anyway. They've got one of the last aboveground buildings and miles of tunnel networks. Only place I know of that has so many people still living all together. The owner, Ellen, she found a way to rig some underground plantations up. Woman's got a green thumb if I ever saw one, and they've got some crops growing. All you gotta be prepared to do when you go is offer whatever you can and be willing to pull your weight," The only ones excused from those rules were the old folks, the sick, and the kids, but even then the kids start working as soon as they're big enough to hold tools, and Dean knows for a fact that the oldest guy working there is well into his seventies. Those who don't work in the fields or helping to fix up whatever equipment that can still be salvaged, to work in food prep or food storage or maintenance. All in all the Roadhouse had turned into a full-blown safe haven, never turning anyone away and never demanding more than a person could give. Dean always wished he were half that giving.

Gordon tilts his head slightly, really examining Dean now as though whatever Dean's just said is completely outrageous. "Roadhouse," He repeats it thoughtfully, then says, "Sam and Dean; that what you said your names were?"

A prickle goes up Dean's spine, his hunter instincts bristling as something warns him that this is not right. Something's going on here. "Yeah, that's what we said," The '_what of it_?' at the end isn't said but it's certainly implied pretty forcefully.

"That wouldn't be Sam and Dean Winchester would it? John Winchester's sons?"

And now Dean's instincts are really flaring up, making him shift slightly where he's sat, trying to straighten up and look more intimidating without waking up Sammy. "Might be. What's it to you?"

Gordon holds up his hands in a placating gesture, clearly meant to calm Dean down. It does almost the opposite, making Dean want to stand up, put himself between his vulnerable little brother and this creepy dude and pull out a knife, just to be safe. "Calm down man," And damn, it sounds like Gordon's close to laughing. "I knew your daddy. Good guy, great hunter,"

Just because the apocalypse twisted monsters until they became terrifying personifications of what they once were doesn't mean hunters have become very well known. Everyone who can hold a weapon is a hunter of a fashion now, no longer a minority but rather the vast majority of the population becoming predators in an attempt to survive. To have them named, to have his father known by such a title, tells Dean that maybe this guy knows more than the Winchester brothers first gave him credit for.

They hadn't told him their first names on introductions because it didn't matter anymore. No one had addresses or bank accounts or social security numbers anymore so why hang on to a last name, of all things? When people got married now (not as uncommon as it sounded, end of the world drove people to make drastic decisions) they didn't exchange last names or rings, just vows and promises that they would probably never be able to keep. For the Winchester name to be known by other hunters meant it was known long before the end of days, back when John Winchester was a regular old hunter that took down regular old monsters. Which meant that in an age completely different from the one they lived in now, Gordon has also been a hunter.

Studying the dark skinned man it's not that much of a stretch to believe it. He's got that uncaring darkness in his eyes, a furrow between his brows. He's jacked too, not skinny like most people have gotten, but jacked in a way that says he takes care of his body, knows how important it is to stay in shape, knows that it's necessary for survival. "So you were a hunter," Dean states, eyebrows rising ever so slightly.

"Ain't we all hunters now kid?" Gordon asks, and when he smiles it doesn't reach his eyes, "The semantics of naming isn't really important is it?"

"You brought it up," Dean points out, bristling again.

Gordon nods, "Fair point, I did. Yeah I was a hunter back in the day. Vamps were my specialty but I took down my share of wolves and Wendigos too,"

Dean inclines his head in understanding. The storms may have mutated all of the monsters, but it also killed off the humans it came in contact with, which left a weird middle ground for the humanoid monsters. Wendigos seemed to be safe, if only because there was barely any human left in there. Werewolves too were spared, if only because the storms made sure they never changed back into their human forms. Vamps, on the other hand, had been killed off the same as humans.

The running theory was that because vampires looked like humans all the time, and needed the same basic things as a human, namely food and sleep (though not as much as humans), and since they could be injured fairly easily, the storms saw their DNA as the same as humans and took them out. Of course no one could know for sure, but at the same time no one really cared unless they'd once been a hunter and had known these things actually used to exist, and of that group of people very few of them actually cared to question _why_. They were just thankful that it was one less monster to deal with on top of everything.

There were other monsters that got wiped out; some that weren't infected at all, but were taken down by the stronger mutations of other monsters. Anything that shared more human DNA than whatever monster DNA they had in them was killed off, but anything with full monster genes or the majority of monster genes had them heightened. It was the way of life now, people adapted. Everyone either died or moved on. That was how it went.

"Me 'n my brother, we've been in the business since we were kids. Dad raised us this way. Kinda thankful for that now, seeing the way things've gone, y'know?"

"Nice to have the skill set necessary to survive, right? Makes it easier to keep yourself alive when you already knew what was out there. Same big, bad uglies. Just bigger, badder and uglier,"

For the first time since the conversation started Dean finds he's smiling a little. "Damn straight. 'Specially if you got a sasquatch like this watching your back." Dean glances down fondly at his little brother, and that was when he notices the slight crease between his brother's eyebrows, the restless shift of his eyes behind his eyelids, and all he can think is _'No, not now, not here,'_

Sam's visions aren't exactly convenient though, and they don't care who's around to witness their destructive path. Within seconds of Dean noticing his baby brother's discomfort Sam is twisting, moaning quietly, and Dean wraps his arm tighter around the kid, tries to keep him still, to comfort him.

"He okay?" Gordon asks, staring at Sam with an intensity that makes Dean uncomfortable.

Nodding Dean twists slightly, tries to shield his brother from Gordon, but it's awkward given the position he's in. "He gets nightmares sometimes," He flashes Gordon a half smile but it looks forced, "Don't we all now?"

Gordon nods but he's still staring at Sam, and Dean twists back to look at the younger Winchester, whispering quietly. "Sam it's okay, listen to me, it's okay, I'm right here, don't worry about anything I got you, okay?" It's the same thing every time, the same litany of useless words that can't stop Sam's pain, can't stop the visions. There's nothing Dean can really do to help but be there when Sam wakes up.

Sweat has broken out across Sam's forehead and he's twisting more violently now, letting out a keening noise of pain, trying to fight his way out of whatever hellish vision he's caught in this time. It goes on for several minutes before he finally snaps out of it, coming to with a gasp of air that would put a nearly-drowned man to shame.

"Dean!" His voice is cracked and pained and it cuts Dean to his core but he's right there anyway, checking Sam's flitting eyes, making sure his nose isn't bleeding again. Maybe it wasn't a bad one this time.

"Right here kiddo, I'm right here, deep breaths, you're okay, it's over, okay? No one here but me,"_ And Gordon, the ex-hunter who may or may not want to kill you if he finds out you're psychic so please don't say anything regarding visions until later. _

"Ellen," And that's unexpected, out of place, and Dean knows it means Sam is going to blurt out his vision and nothing Dean can say will be fast enough to stop him. "Ellen's in trouble, Roadhouse is in trouble. Dean people are gonna die," Sam's eyes are frantic and Dean knows his little brother has no idea what he's just said, what he's just done.

Gordon does though. Dean hears shifting behind him and looks over his shoulder to see Gordon standing and _fuck_, where the hell did he get a gun? No one has those anymore, no way.

"Your brother's a fucking _psychic_? And you haven't killed him yet?" Gordon's voice is a snarl and Dean feels Sam flinch beneath him.

"No one's killing my brother!" Dean practically yells the words, but he sees Gordon cock the gun, take careful aim at the exposed part of Sam's broad shoulders, too wide for Dean to successfully cover. "You make a move on him you'll be dead before you hit the ground you understand me? Do I make myself clear?!"

The older man is shaking his head, smiling like he thinks Dean is some cute kid who demanded more candy or something. "He's a freak, Dean, a monster. You gotta take action against these things before they try to take it against us," And he's pulling the trigger and Dean hardly knows how to react.


End file.
